John Delcos enters his third season covering the Mets for The Journal News after eight seasons on the Yankees beat. Prior to coming to New York, John covered the Baltimore Orioles, Cleveland Browns and Cleveland Indians.

The question becomes, John… where the hell did the Mets medical staff get their licenses, a Crackerjack box?

Who was the guy or gal who told Willie and Omar that Castillo would be magically six years younger after knee surgery, that they’d get even sixty games out of Alou, that two concussions in short order wouldn’t MAYBE be a reason to DL a guy?

And, moreover, how delusional and/or desperate were they to believe that staff?

How much of this season’s hope was predicated on medical dicerolls that should’ve been seen to come up “craps” early and often?

Who was believing what out of real medical ignorance and who was believing what out of a stretching desire to save their jobs?

Abt time. This could have ended Church’s career. They should have done it a lot sooner.As soon as he suffered the 2nd concussion. It was not fair to him to drag him along. If they did it right away, he could have been ok by now and playing regularly. Now who knows how long it will take him to recoup rate.

Craig – firing Willie is not the answer. He plays with what he has gotten from Minyana.Just like in a card game. If you think Willie should go so should Minyana. Don’t know what goes on in the clubhouse, but the chemistry is not there. Getting younger I think will be the answer, but it takes patience with young prospects, something that most Mets fans do not have.

Yes, spot on. Adam Rubin makes the dubious claim that, as of March 29, the Mets had the oldest 40-man roster in baseball. It’s dubious for a number of reasons: March 29 is an arbitrary date; the inclusion of the 15 non-roster players can be biased by organizational needs that are never actually realized on the 25-man squad; and it’s just not an accurate reflection of team age.

Here are the actual oldest teams, based on who’s acutally played for them in 2008:

Well, it’s been well documented by me that Minaya has done a bad job and has killed this franchise. It only gets worse from here because i don’t see how the mets will get better in the future. The farm system is lame and have old players in key spots. I agree with Adam Rubin.

I disagree. There are a lot of very good parts here. Three of the eight regulars are All-Stars and relatively young, and a fourth has arguably been the best of the bunch. They’ve got one of the best—if not the best—starting pitchers of the last five years fronting their rotation, backed by a pair of 27-yr-old power pitchers who each won 15 games last year. And, waiting in the wings to assume larger roles are a teenager power hitter who some believe will hit 40 hr, as well as a young starter who has been compared to Brandon Webb.

These very good parts haven’t been working well. I don’t think that’s Omar’s fault.

I think Oliver Perez winning 15 games last year was more of an aberration. Johan Santana will be turning 30 and his best days are behind him. The three players you consider all stars are borderline all-stars. I don’t know who you are referring to when you mentioned a “teenager power hitter who some believe will hit 40 hr, as well as a young starter who has been compared to Brandon Webb.”

It’s Omar’s fault that he traded and over paid to bring in Delgado at the end of his prime years. It’s Omar’s fault that he over paid for alou which all baseball people knew was injury prone. it’s Omar’s fault that he brought in Easley and anderson, two aging players that are not good defensively and there better days are behind them. It’s Omar’s fault that he signed Castillo to a long contract knowing he had two bad knees. It’s Omar’s fault that he traded away Heath Bell and Bannister for garbage. It’s Omar’s fault for not resigning bradford but for the same amount of money he signs Scott Schoeneweis. It’s Omar’s fault for resigning El Duke when we all witness him breaking down at the end of the last two years when we needed him the most. It’s Omar’s fault for continuously stocking the farm system (AAA) and bringing these players up to the big club he got off the scrap pile.

By the way, Omar Minaya had nothing to do with Wright and reyes, those players were drafted by the old regime, not Minaya. Omar brought in Beltran who to me is a good center fielder but is very inconsistent offensively and not a clutch hitter and was over paid.

Tomg: I think Omar is to blame too, but I’ll never complain about him making a mistake in signing Beltran and trading for Delgado. Beltran has been great the last two years and obviously came off of the series of his life with Houston. I don’t think anyone could have predicted coming off his 2006 season that Delgado would be finished.

I don’t care what sport it is but the way to build a winning team and keep it a winning team is threw the drafting and developing a farm system. Take the yankees for example. The reason why the Yankees had a nice little dynasty going in the late 90’s early 20’s was because they developed a farm system and built a good nucleus of young players. Than to fill certain areas they traded to fill those spots. The yankees since than have tried to buy through free agency and how is that working.

Steve,
Ok, I’ll give you Beltran and delgado. Maybe that just me with those two players because I don’t like beltran because it was well documented that he wanted to go to the yankees and had boras go back to the yankees to tell the yankees he would take 10 mil less to sign with them and the yankees still weren’t interested. Delgado blew the mets off and knocked certain people in the mets organization. That told me all I needed to know about these two players.

I still think Delgado is a cancer in the mets club house. The day he is gone the better the mets will be and I’m not talking about delgado on the field. I’m talking about him in the club house. If I was the mets I wouldn’t want him anywhere near my young players.

Beltran overpaid? what is overpaid? Two gold gloves and two silver slugger awards would indicate he is one of the best if not the best CF in the NL.

I’ll grant you that he is no Manny Ramirez (or pick your own clutch hitter), but you are going to pay 17MM for gold gloves and silver slugger level offense (You could argue that he should be paid 14-15MM. But we are talking a couple Mill-I hope that is your point tomg). DW and Reyes will make that kind of $$ someday too. That’s the way it is.

If you want more clutch hitting, 20-25MM will do it b/c clutch hitters usually also lead the MLs in BA, RBI, HRs, etc… that lead to “clutch” hitting. And when a guy leads the league in those categories they get paid over 20MM.

Actually, Omar gave up very little for Delgado. Mike Jacobs is a modern-day Rico Brogna, and Yusmerio Petit hasn’t fooled anyone since AA. (And the Marlins also sent along several million in cash to offset the cost of Delgado’s contract.)

Let’s say that Delgado has become a clubhouse cancer. Who’s responsible for managing the clubhouse?

Yes, that’s what I’m saying, Omar Minaya over paid, not by allot. I guess I have it in for Beltran because he wanted to go to the yankees, not the Mets and had his agent approach the yankees and was willing to take 10 mil less off the total amount but the yankees were not intertested.

He is a cancer,He’s a veteran who has declining skills, a bad attitude and no leadership skills, He wont be here next year and I’m sure if they could, he’d be gone this year, as well as Willie. Lets hope theWilpons will shell out for Texiera, a bat like that in the lineup will do wonders for Wright and Beltran.

Tiffany,
Usually the manager but wiullie’s hands are tied because of Omar and his right hand man tony Bernazard. They protect the latino players so it’s hard for willie. Willie was a lame duck manager when he came to the mets. Why do you think Omar wanted to hire him and not Lou Piniella or a manager who will demand to bring in his own people. Willie could only bring in one and Omar fire him. This is Omar controlling things, willie is in a in a bad situation with this regime. I’m not saying willie is a good manager but it’s hard when you have Omar and Tony Bernazard behing your back and protecting the latino players. I know supposedly that’s not happening anymore but I don’t believe it.

Minaya said he’s working the phone every day, trying to see if players who could help are available. He’s considered changing the makeup of the 25-man roster but said nothing out there at the moment makes sense. With five weeks left before the All-Star break, few if any clubs are ready to give up and trade a valuable commodity.

Yea, the mets are going up a s@@ts creek. I cringe when I here Omar is working the phones. What is going to do, now that the mets just supposedly had a good draft in a deep draft Omar is going to make bad trades and give up already young talent. Patience is a virtue and if this season is a bust, so be it. I rather not make any hasty dumb trades to fix leaks in the wall
that will probably be a temporary fix that is not all of a sudden going to make the mets a championship contender.